Church buys Katrina evacuees a house for $75K, evacuees never move in, sell the house for $88K, take the money and run. News catches up with them, the husband blasts the church and tells them to "take it up with god" if they want their money back. It's probably the most infuriating thing I've seen all year.

Story
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20061122/ap_on_re_us/katrina_gift_house

Video
http://www.myfoxmemphis.com/myfox/pages/InsideFox/Detail?contentId=1487999&version=5&locale=EN-US&layoutCode=VSTY&pageId=5.7.1



[Edited on November 24, 2006 at 1:57 AM. Reason : Shouldnt call them victims]

11/24/2006 1:56:15 AM

Why? It's their choice if they want to move into the house or not...

11/24/2006 2:01:14 AM

Don't tell me you support these assholes

11/24/2006 2:02:52 AM

I just don't see why you're so up in arms. If there was no prior agreement that they had to live in the house then it's their choice what to do with the free gift they receive. What if they decided that they didn't want to live in New Orleans anymore and to move somewhere to start a new life? Is it fair for the church to *force* them to live in that exact house?

11/24/2006 2:05:59 AM

I think the verbal agreement was that they would move to Memphis. The worst thing was the way the husband attacked the church and were generally ungrateful. They could have said that they wanted to move somewhere else and buy a house there,that might have been acceptable. But it seems pretty obvious that they are going to squander it on useless crap.

11/24/2006 2:18:36 AM

wow. thats disgusting... the video gets into how she lied on the paperwork and said she wasnt married. then again, her "husband" is such a fag i wouldnt be surprised.

to the people who are gonna say "immoral is not illegal" -- i think its pretty illegal. at the very LEAST, its obtaining property by false pretenses. they implied that they needed it for them and their kids, etc. and that guy is like "take it up with god" -- im not a religious person at all and that fucked with me.

they'll get what's coming to them. if it's not criminal charges, some lawyer will come up with a way for the church to fuck them back. i can't wait to hear more developments on this. those people are scum personified.

11/24/2006 5:05:13 AM

even if they decided they didnt want to live there they shouldnt have profited off the church. It would have been less repugnant to give the profit from the house to the church or donate it to charity.

11/24/2006 5:48:42 AM

This is detestable and it just goes to show how ungrateful people are.

I wouldn't think legal action is the way to go, though. These people will waste that money and end up destitute. All that needs to be done is enough press so that charity workers can recognize these assholes when they come begging for more.

11/24/2006 8:20:49 AM

"Take it up with God!"

Die.

11/24/2006 11:25:20 AM

This is not surprising at all. Stories like this are commonplace, and it's one of the main reasons that I don't believe in charity.

11/24/2006 11:40:05 AM

$88K is a hell of a lot of crack

11/24/2006 11:55:58 AM

"What are you going to do with the money?"
"...ummmmm....."

jerks

11/24/2006 11:56:20 AM

The house was given to them, and so it's theirs do dispose of as they wish. However, that does not reduce the ass-hattery of their actions any less.

11/24/2006 11:57:58 AM

to get the house they had to lie through their teeth about how they wanted to move there and such.

11/24/2006 12:19:45 PM

i sympathize with the hatred expressed towards the katrina people here, but lets also consider the manipulative nature of the church groups who come down there and "minister" to these people when all they're actually trying to do is proselytize.

its just like all these fucking missions around the nation that force homeless people to sit through a shitty-ass condemnational chapel service before getting fed. Either feed the fucking homeless, or don't feed them. Making people sit through judgemental bullshit is just as bad if not worse than what these people did to the church. At least the church had a choice whether or not they rebuilt the house. The homeless people don't really have many options when it comes to getting their food/house/etc.

I am going to have to side against the church on this one. they got theirs.

[Edited on November 24, 2006 at 12:30 PM. Reason : s]

11/24/2006 12:26:29 PM

I hate proselytizing as much as the next athiest, but lets not go overboard here. The church didn't spend $75,000 to try to convert a family to christianity. They spent that money on a charitable cause because their doctrine of faith calls for selfless deeds like that.

11/24/2006 12:38:22 PM

apparently it wasn't so selfless

11/24/2006 1:49:03 PM

not to turn this into a racial thing, but

11/24/2006 2:08:32 PM

Quote :

"Either feed the fucking homeless, or don't feed them. Making people sit through judgemental bullshit is just as bad if not worse than what these people did to the church. "

First off, was there any indication that these people weren't already Christians?

Also, just because you don't believe in it doesn't discount the fact that to evangelists (which is a group I do not belong to) feeding their soul through evangelism is as important as feeding their bodies with free food. If the homeless people have a problem with sitting through 3 hours of that kind of crap, then they can head to some atheistic ministry and get free food there.

11/24/2006 3:35:13 PM

yea thats my point. turnabout is fair-play.

christians exploit the poverty-stricken

the poverty-stricken exploit the christians

waaaaaahmbulance!!1

11/24/2006 5:39:59 PM

so i didnt click the links

but im guessing they were black

11/24/2006 6:04:33 PM

if they're telling the truth, they paid someone 1/3 to sell that house for them.

haha they'll be broke again in no time, they were giving the money away before they even had it

[Edited on November 24, 2006 at 6:09 PM. Reason : ^yeah they were]

11/24/2006 6:08:46 PM

a) karma, they will get theirs.

b)

Quote :

"christians exploit the poverty-stricken"

i know you're a troll, but i'll bite. how do all christians exploit the poor?

11/24/2006 6:38:18 PM

$88K. I would have dropped it on a new beamer, alcohol, weed, clothes, and a year of paid rent in an apartment some place cool like Miami, LA, NYC or something.

11/24/2006 6:58:37 PM

Next time, either help them build a house, sell them a house at cost, or let them live there rent free. Don't be so trusting.

11/24/2006 7:31:46 PM

hope they enjoy the new rims

11/24/2006 7:42:24 PM

Isn't this what the US is all about?

11/24/2006 7:49:30 PM

Well clearly the church fucked up.......

They should have placed some deed restrictions on the house as to what it could be used for or better yet just kept title to it and allowed the evacuees to live in it.

What the evacuees did was wrong, but the church set itself up for that.

11/29/2006 9:04:27 PM

Quote :

"yea thats my point. turnabout is fair-play. christians exploit the poverty-stricken the poverty-stricken exploit the christians waaaaaahmbulance!!1"

What the fuck kind of logic is that?

12/6/2006 3:02:36 PM

would it have been as repugnant if they had lived there five years and then sold the house and moved?

i mean really, what difference does it make. instead of giving the people a house, they've given them money in the amount of the worth of the house. while maybe giving cold hard cash isn't as attractive a gift. what difference does it make in the end?

12/6/2006 3:17:37 PM

Well, you make a good point at first about how long they should live there before a move would be considered "ethical"

But IMO, the difference is that cash can be spent on useless things like drugs, fancier-than-needed cars, and alcohol. A house doesn't have that ability (unless you're talking about a home equity line being used).

In my opinion, the church should have simply paid for them to live in the house, rather than transferring title.

12/6/2006 3:23:03 PM

Take out the entire church part for a sec...

If a non-profit charity bought or built a house for a couple who then turned around and sold the unit for a profit one year later, would it be considered unethical or wrong? Fair game or would it simply be that the non-profit played it stupid? Afterall, if a non-religious group was providing charity, say the Boy Scouts or the Rotary Club, would what the people did be distasteful? Fair game?

I think people are letting the entire fact that the non-profit happen to be a church distract them from the core issue here. The religious view this as an aggravated insult while the anti-religious view this as a way to stick it to a group they dislike (and the non-religious simply don't care).

Just a thought.

12/6/2006 4:02:18 PM

(boy scouts isn't non-religious, fyi. they are expressly judeo-christian)

12/6/2006 4:05:51 PM

(Meh, you get the point.)

12/6/2006 8:30:40 PM

Quote :

"I think people are letting the entire fact that the non-profit happen to be a church distract them from the core issue here. The religious view this as an aggravated insult while the anti-religious view this as a way to stick it to a group they dislike (and the non-religious simply don't care)."

Good point. Some people are just inventing facts that don't even apply to the situation.

The fact that the family didn't have a decent defense for their actions is damning enough.

12/6/2006 9:05:41 PM